


what's a home (the first place you learn to run from)

by Vail



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Adopted Genji, Adopted Sibling Relationship, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Pre-Canon, Brotherhood, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Overwatch, Young Genji Shimada, Young Hanzo Shimada, alternative universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-18
Updated: 2017-08-18
Packaged: 2018-12-17 00:30:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11840250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vail/pseuds/Vail
Summary: “Two dragons!” the elders whisper among themselves in delight. It’s not unheard of, but it hasn’t been seen in generations.“Surely,” one of them murmurs to another, “the dragons are recognizing the sole, true heir. They have offered their combined protection to Hanzo.”Genji, who has spent all this time making himself small, trying to fit, feels cold in the deepest hollows of his bones, like a flood of ice down his back. When it comes down to it, his brother is his brother in name only. Genji is not a Shimada by blood, and blood, it seems, is all that will ever matter.--Or, an Adopted!Genji AU. It changes less than you might think.





	what's a home (the first place you learn to run from)

**Author's Note:**

> In this fic, Genji was adopted by Sojiro (the leader of the Shimada Clan / Hanzo's father) as a baby. He has never known his birth parents.

_ What is a home _

_ if not the first place you learn to run from? _

 

_ You’ve got to bite the hand _

_ that starves you, and in doing so _

 

_ Praise the place that birthed you. _

 

_ \-  _ [ _ Clementine Von Radics _ ](http://clementinepoetry.us/post/145084715334/this-is-the-house-that-built-me-and-im-gonna#notes)

 

* * *

 

Genji doesn’t know if the name he answers to is the name that his mother gave him, or if someone in the Shimada thought it would be amusing to name him after the fabled second son. 

 

Some days, he’s not sure why they took him in at all. 

 

Outside the clan’s halls, the people of Hanamura don’t realize that he and Hanzo are not related by blood. They smile at Genji’s mischief compared to Hanzo’s studious nature. Food stall owners give them treats and tell them, mock-sternly, to share as siblings should. Once in a rare while, Hanzo can be convinced to skip lessons and they run off together to play at the arcade. The elderly man who runs it lifts an eyebrow at their presence during school hours, but raises a finger to his lips with a bemused glint in his eye. At the end of the day, they climb over the high walls surrounding the compound and enter through the servant’s door to beg dinner from the kitchens before going off to accept their scolding.

 

In those early years, they are brothers in all the ways that matter.

 

Genji sneaks into the training halls at night and practices swinging Hanzo’s katana before he is old enough to have his own. Somehow, Hanzo _ always _ knows, even when Genji is careful to clean it and place it back exactly where it was, and yells at him for touching it in the morning.

 

(Genji as a child is not quite as subtle as he thinks. Hanzo wakes when he hears his younger sibling’s footsteps on the creaking wood floor of their shared bedroom and trails him, watches Genji to reassure himself that no terrible accidents will happen in the dark of night.) 

 

But as they grow older - old enough to not only listen at closed doors but understand what they hear - things begin to change.

 

The elders are unhappy with Genji’s presence. They protest that he cannot be the spare heir without a drop of Shimada blood in his veins; that if Sojiro had simply wanted a playmate for his son, Genji could have been that without wearing their name. In lower whispers, some murmur over how he excels in combat training, that he almost matches Hanzo for every step and strike despite the years between them. Their brotherly competition is a sign for trouble - he might try to grasp power for himself in the future, and bring the downfall of their empire. 

Genji shakes his head and slips away. The clan may not have his full loyalty, but only because it lies with Hanzo. He would never try to steal his brother’s birthright. 

 

* * *

 

He tries to change their minds. Genji keeps his head down, starts walking a step behind Hanzo instead of beside him to indicate that he wants to be his brother’s right hand, not take his place. He trains hard because, well, even if he tries to study it will never be his strength. That’s alright. A second son doesn’t need to know history and diplomacy, as long as he can strike where Hanzo tells him to and guard his back. 

 

And the worst part is Hanzo, who looks worried at first, seems to eventually decide that this is Genji  _ growing up _ , becoming more mature. He praises Genji for his hard work and the odd distance that had begun to grow between them closes. Genji follows Hanzo to meetings with his - their - father and the elders, sits silently and listens; goes with Hanzo when they must visit rival families or those who owe the Shimada and keeps a pointed hand on the hilt of his blade. 

 

It gets easier, with time. Genji folds his old self up like origami and shoves it away. This is what he is meant to be, he tells himself, even if he feels more and more like a ghost, a shadow. Even a caged bird can sing - nobody asks him for his opinions and he doesn’t give them. Nobody will hear him. Nobody is listening. 

 

Hanzo’s 20th birthday arrives with great fanfare. When the children of the clan head turn 20, (“Those of the main Shimada bloodline,”  their teacher had reiterated snidely, when both brothers were too young to understand) they take part in a ritual to be chosen by the dragons that have been part of the family’s legacy since its beginnings. The dragons are their guardians, their allies in combat, a part of them from that day forward. 

 

‘Shimada blood is dragon’s blood’, the saying goes. 

 

The shrine has a room that is kept empty and clean by one servant designated for the honor. It has been used for every ritual in the last few centuries, and is otherwise only ever entered by the elders and the clan head’s immediate family. 

 

Hanzo has to argue for Genji to be allowed to attend, but the elders give in easily enough. Genji’s change in behavior in recent years has reassured them.  He sits, a little awkwardly, at the back of the room, a small distance from Sojiro and Hanzo’s mother. (It has been a long, long time since he called either of them anything besides  _ Shimada-sama _ .) 

 

Hanzo sits  _ seiza _ in the center of the room, looking down at bowl inlaid with veins of gold. Slowly, he slices his palm open and holds it over the bowl. The soft  _ drip drip drip  _ of his blood is a steady beat that seems to echo, impossibly loud.

 

The shrine room is windowless and the door is tightly locked, but suddenly it fills with sweeping gusts of wind from no source at all. The wind brings blue light, and a sound so deep it rings in Genji’s ears and he couldn’t, even if he tried, explain it as a song or a voice or notes of any kind. There’s a chill that raises the hair on the nape of his neck and the pounding of his heart and pressure upon his shoulders and - and this is power too old and inhuman to describe. 

 

The blue light grows and grows and then spins itself into a needlepoint that dives to strike at Hanzo’s shoulder. It crackles down his upper arm like lightning burns. Hanzo grits his teeth and watches it spread in silent wonder.

 

When the light ends, slips away as abruptly as it appeared, the room feels dark and small where it seemed resplendent only moments earlier. But even in the dim candle glow, they can see Hanzo’s upper arm - where not one, but  _ two  _ serpentine dragons lay twisted together, coils of scales and spikes. Genji looks at it and feels like he does when he watches the waves of the ocean during a storm. 

 

_ “Two dragons!”  _ the elders whisper amongst themselves in delight. It’s not unheard of, but it hasn’t been seen in generations. One of them hobbles forward, and unsteadily traces her finger around the outline of the dragons’ heads, her wrinkled face lit up with awe. 

 

“You’ve been blessed, child,” she says softly. 

 

“Surely,” one of the other elders murmurs to another, “the dragons are recognizing the sole, true heir. They have offered their combined protection to Hanzo.” 

 

Genji, who has spent all this time making himself small, trying to  _ fit _ , feels cold in the deepest hollows of his bones, like a flood of ice down his back. When it comes down to it, his brother is his brother in name only. Genji is not a Shimada by blood, and blood, it seems, is all that will ever matter. 

 

* * *

 

Hanzo turns his focus to controlling the dragons, learning how to wield them, getting to know them. “They’re….not like people,” Hanzo admits to him, “but they’re  _ beings _ . They tell me things - they disagree with each other, sometimes, but they watch and think and - Genji, they know  _ so much _ .” 

 

But he won’t share their names. “I can’t,” Hanzo insists. “You know if I would tell anyone, it would be you, brother, but - not this. It’s not mine to tell. You’ll understand-” and then he cuts himself off, looking shame-faced.  

 

Genji  _ wants _ to understand. He knows what Hanzo was going to say - ‘ _ You’ll understand when you meet your dragon _ ’ - but he won’t because there  _ is _ no dragon waiting for him, is there? And it’s - Hanzo has never coddled him. Genji wouldn’t have wanted him to lie just to make Genji feel better, not if he didn’t really believe it. 

 

But still.

 

Genji’s so tired, and it’s harder and harder to remember why he ever bothered trying at all. 

 

He decides to go with a different method of showing his disinterest in clan affairs. He dyes his hair the green of spring leaves, skips meetings to play and flirt with girls (and boys) in the city beyond the Shimada compound. With neon hair and street clothes, nobody recognizes him at all.

 

It’s freeing, in a lot of ways. He’s spent so long forcing himself to be silent that it takes awhile to get used to being loud again. But once he lets himself act how he wants….he loves hearing people laugh.  _ Making _ them laugh, watching their eyes crinkle. He takes his dates to karaoke and sings, badly and off-key, at the top of his lungs. They go dancing at clubs and it’s such a relief, to jump up and down senselessly. He’s spent his entire life honing his body into a weapon and instead of holding a blade, his arms are up in the air or wrapped around another warm body and it’s - 

 

God, he’s finally starting to feel human again. 

 

It was never going to last.

 

Hanzo eventually finds him in an  _ izakaya _ , drinking alone, when Genji is just tipsy enough to begin feeling unsteady in his chair. 

 

“Genji,” his brother hisses, grabbing him by the upper arm. “When I heard from the clan that you’d been spotted here, I thought it must have been a mistake. Have you been here all the times you skipped -” He pauses, eyes glancing warily around the bar, “lessons?” He leans back, looks Genji up and down, and wrinkles his nose. “What have you done with your  _ hair? _ And your clothes! What are you wearing!” 

 

Genji shrugs, a loose roll of his shoulders. “The  _ yakitori _ here is excellent,” he tells Hanzo. He’s buzzed - not so buzzed that he  _ can’t _ answer those questions, but he’s just aware enough to know he’d rather not. 

 

Hanzo snarls and pulls him up, looking furious. “I know the elders have been….unkind in their words to you, but do you think acting like this will help? How will misbehavior and drowning your sorrows improve your reputation?” He throws a crumpled handful of bills to cover Genji’s tab on the counter and drags him outside into the cold night. 

 

In a quieter setting, the elder brother softens his voice. “That they cannot see your strengths is a flaw in them, not you. But this - this  _ irresponsibility _ , it will not help. Come back.”

 

Genji pulls his arm loose and drops his eyes. Their shadows stretch down the street, backlit by shop windows and glowing signs. As a child, he stood in front of Hanzo and laughed at how he disappeared seamlessly into the dark shape of his big brother. Now, their shadows are the same length, facing each other down.

 

“What makes you think I care about my reputation?” Genji asks, struggling to keep his words clear. The ground feels like it’s shifting beneath his feet. “And it’s been over a year since I moved out - why now? What do they want from me now?”

 

Hanzo shakes his head. “Not them,” he responds, his voice rough. “Father - he’s ill, Genji. The doctors say he has the rest of the year, at best. I must prepare to take his place, and...I need you with me, Genji. Please, come home.”

 

Gravity realigns itself. Genji feels startlingly sober. 

 

He doesn’t want to give this up - what’s he found, what he’s learned about himself, outside of who the Shimada raised him to be. Going back to that compound feels like a death sentence - he already knows he will be asked to kill some new, fragile part of himself even before they send him out to kill someone else.

 

But it’s Hanzo. His older brother, saying that he needs Genji. 

 

“Alright,” he says. “Alright. For you.” 

 

* * *

 

Genji goes back to live in the Shimada compound, attends meetings with Hanzo, follows him on visits and assignments. But now he walks next to him, tells the elders when he thinks their opinions are stupid and irrelevant (often), jokingly flirts with their main rival’s daughter (she’s cute, flirts back, they both enjoy watching her father turn red with anger), and has maybe a bit too much fun with the missions he’s given.

 

It drives the elders  _ crazy _ . Hanzo too, for that matter. 

 

But he watches Genji laugh and the way his grass-green hair highlights the hazel in his eyes and wonders how he never noticed when his younger brother first stopped smiling. 

 

So he ignores the elders’ demands that he force his brother to stop acting this way. Hanzo’s going to be the next leader of the Shimada - who are they to try to make him do anything? 

 

* * *

 

_ The bowl is still stained red from Hanzo’s ritual. He cuts his palm and watches the blood pool past the red line until it’s filling the bowl and the only sound in the room is still that maddening, steady drip-drip-drip. _

 

_ The wind never comes. _

 

* * *

 

Genji wakes up, sweat dripping down his face.

 

He’s been having this nightmare every night for the last week leading up to today - his 20th birthday. 

 

The elders had refused to even offer him the formal ceremony. Hanzo had looked at him with sad eyes and said nothing and - and Genji, haunted by the thought of  _ nothing happening _ , hadn’t pushed. They don’t believe he’d be worthy of a dragon - and he can’t blame them. It is what it is. 

 

The day goes by in a blur - nobody talks about why instead of the main family locking themselves away for the ritual, Genji gets a ridiculous, over-the-top party thrown in his honor instead. He tries to enjoy it and finds that he actually does. Some of the friends he made while he lived out in Hanamura come. His cousins pound the table and chant as he downs shots. It’s fun. It’s what he wants - really, why would he want to spend his birthday in a stuffy room with the elders?

 

Night falls and people start drifting away. Hanzo leads Genji back to his room, shoves a bottle of water in his face and watches Genji drink the whole thing before he ruffles his hair and pushes him to bed. “Good night, Genji,” Hanzo tells him with a smile. “Happy birthday.”

 

“Thanks,  _ aniki _ ,” Genji says. He thinks that’s what he said. He’s had  _ a lot  _ of sake. 

 

He waits until he hears Hanzo walk away down the hall before dragging himself up, using his bedstand table to support himself, and wanders over to the window. It’s almost midnight. Outside, the moon is full and high in the sky. The cherry blossoms are in bloom but the petals fluttering through the air look red. One falls into Genji’s open palm. 

 

He looks down at it, and then reaches for the knife at his ankle. Even drunk, his hands don’t shake. Carefully, Genji cuts his palm, neatly slicing the petal in half, and sticks his arm out into the night air. He closes his eyes.

 

Nothing happens.

 

He clenches his fist, smearing blood all over his hand. He cut a little too deeply and it stings, he knows it’s going to hurt tomorrow when he has to hold his katana for practice but what does it matter, how drunk must he be, to have thought - 

 

He goes to close the window but before he can, the wind whips in and slams the window back open. Genji looks up, eyes wide, as the air grows brighter and brighter until the light curls up into one tight beam and lances him through the heart. 

 

The next morning, he walks down to breakfast wearing his shirt unbuttoned. He sits down to eat, smiles, and doesn’t say a word as Sojiro and Hanzo and the servants all gape at him and the vibrant green dragon wrapped around his chest. 

 

_ Wait until your elders see me, _ Hikaru whispers in his mind.

 

* * *

 

It takes fives years. 

 

When Genji and Hanzo finally fight, Genji can only think of the story that their nursemaid told them - of brothers who fought and came to a standstill because their dragons would not harm the other.

 

Genji can’t bring himself to summon his dragon with intent. Hikaru isn’t coherent, but he can sense the dragon’s despair and rage. He wonders if Hikaru  _ knows _ Hanzo’s dragons, if the dragons can speak. He’s never thought to ask.

 

It’s a little late for it now.

 

He hopes that Hanzo can’t - won’t - summon his dragons either, hopes as long as their blades clash and only the sound of metal rings through the air, until - 

 

Blue light burns through him, across his flesh and down to his bones. Genji can’t breathe. All the air is gone, and there is no green in sight. Hikaru is - screaming, it’s the worst sound and it’s no sound at all - and there’s no green and there’s no wind and Hanzo’s dragons  _ will kill him  _ and Genji wonders - if his dragon and his sword and the crest on his uniform are Shimada, if his name is his own to keep and take into the next life.

 

(It is. When he wakes up, no longer fully human but still with a dragon’s might beneath the carbon and steel, the healer walks in and asks for his name.

 

He tells her, “Genji.”

 

“Last name?” He knows that she knows. She was with the team that found him. Why is she - 

 

She smiles gently, and he thinks she’s trying to be kind. She’s giving him a choice. 

 

“Just Genji,” he says, and watches as she blacks out the field for the family name in his papers.) 

**Author's Note:**

> I have a lot of thoughts regarding the second half of this fic - for one, I might do a sequel that branches off the dragon ritual/ceremony idea and other ways that Genji might have gotten his spirit dragon. 
> 
> As far as Hanzo and Genji fighting - I wanted to give them a happy ending, but at the same time, a lot of things in this fic/universe happen similarly to how they did in canon, just for different reasons. This fic's Hanzo has loved Genji all his life and never worried about competing with him. Genji is his brother regardless of blood but also a non-factor in terms of succession. When Genji gets his dragon, it changes everything - tradition, the history of the clan, all the stories that say only those of the main family's line are gifted with the spirits. It makes Hanzo question everything. On top of the pressure of having to take over the clan, he starts doubting his brother and loses his support system.
> 
> Comments, crit, and feedback of all sorts are welcome! Or talk to me about your Overwatch feels, I'm amaranthined on Tumblr.


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